The victim was hit in the head when he was sleeping, said police. (Representational)
A 93-year-old priest of a temple was killed by unidentified assailants in Diggi town in Rajasthan's Tonk district, police said on Wednesday.
Locals held a sit-in outside the Bhuriya Mahadev Baba temple demanding the arrest of the perpetrators of the Tuesday incident.
Siyaram Das Maharaj was hit in the head when he was sleeping. He used to stay alone in the temple and has been there for the last 50 years, police said. The priest was a resident of Karauli district.
"It is a case of murder and a medical board has been constituted to conduct the postmortem," Tonk Superintendent of Police Rajarshi Raj Verma said and added that a search is being conducted to trace the assailants.
He said that forensic experts were called to the spot to collect evidence and a dog squad had also been deployed.
BJP state vice-president and Tonk MP Sukhbir Singh Jaunpuria attacked the Ashok Gehlot government over the incident.
He alleged that the administration is only engaged in promoting the government's agenda. "It is a highly condemnable incident. The administration is in deep slumber and it is not bothered about anything," Jaunpuria said.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)